Hana Hladíková

"You had to apply for a visit, they allowed it once every quarter or so. We lived far away and the service was poor, so they scheduled our visit at 7 am, so we took the trip at night. I remember spending hours at the station in Nezamyslice at night, then arriving in Mohelnice in the morning where there was a decent innkeeper who had already opened the pub and was making tea. Then it was up the bridleway past the castle, and there was some gloomy waiting room with other people. Then we were pushed into a room where there were these boxes. They pushed us up against one of them, and on the other side of the box they put dad in an ugly uniform. There was a partition between us, like at the post office, a grill and a small window, likely glass, and one without glass with a grill. I was six or seven years old. I don't know if the visit was long or short, I just remember the environment. It was quite depressing. Mum kept saying, 'Say something to dad!' And I couldn't get a syllable out. So I don't know what the poor guy was thinking."